How to Install OpenMRS on Ubuntu 20.04

OpenMRS is a free and open-source project to develop software for delivering health care in developing countries. It is an enterprise electronic medical record system framework that allows the exchange of patient data with other medical information systems. It is written in Java and provides a web interface to manage electronic medical records.

In this post, we will show you how to install OpenMRS on Ubuntu 20.04.

Prerequisites

• A Ubuntu 20.04 VPS with root access enabled or a user with sudo privileges.

Log in via SSH and Update your System

First, you will need to log in to your Ubuntu 20.04 VPS via SSH as the root user:

ssh root@IP_ADDRESS -p PORT_NUMBER

Next, run the following commands to upgrade all installed packages on your VPS:

apt-get update -y

Once all the packages are updated, restart your system to apply the changes.

Install Java 8

OpenMRS is a Java-based application and only supports Java version 8. So you will need to install Java 8 on your server. You can install it by running the following command:

apt-get install openjdk-8-jdk -y

Once Java is installed, verify the Java version using the following command:

java -version

You will get the following output:

openjdk version "1.8.0_312"
OpenJDK Runtime Environment (build 1.8.0_312-8u312-b07-0ubuntu1~20.04-b07)
OpenJDK 64-Bit Server VM (build 25.312-b07, mixed mode)

Install MySQL Server 5.6

OpenMRS only supports MySQL version 5.6. By default, MySQL 5.6 is not available in the Ubuntu 20.04 default repository. So you will need to install it from the source.

First, create a user and group for MySQL using the following command:

groupadd mysql
useradd -g mysql mysql

Next, download MySQL 5.6 source with the following command:

wget https://dev.mysql.com/get/Downloads/MySQL-5.6/mysql-5.6.46-linux-glibc2.12-x86_64.tar.gz

Once the MySQL is downloaded, extract it with the following command:

tar -xvf mysql-5.6.46-linux-glibc2.12-x86_64.tar.gz

Next, move the extracted directory to /usr/local with the following command:

mv mysql-5.6.46-linux-glibc2.12-x86_64 /usr/local/mysql

Next, navigate to the /usr/local directory and set proper ownership with the following command:

cd /usr/local/mysql
chown -R mysql:mysql *

Next, install the required dependencies using the following command:

apt-get install libaio1 libncurses5 libnuma-dev -y

Next, install MySQL with the following command:

scripts/mysql_install_db --user=mysql

Next, set proper ownership to MySQL directory and data directory:

chown -R root .
chown -R mysql data

Next, copy the MySQL configuration file and service file:

cp support-files/my-default.cnf /etc/my.cnf
cp support-files/mysql.server /etc/init.d/mysql.server

Next, start the MySQL service in safe mode:

bin/mysqld_safe --user=mysql &

Next, set the MySQL root password with the following command:

bin/mysqladmin -u root password newpassword

Next, create a link of the MySQL binary:

ln -s /usr/local/mysql/bin/mysql /usr/local/bin/mysql

Finally, restart your server with the following command:

reboot

After the reboot, start the MySQL service and enable it to start at system reboot:

/etc/init.d/mysql.server start
update-rc.d -f mysql.server defaults

Install Tomcat 7

First, create a user and group for Tomcat with the following command:

groupadd tomcat
useradd -s /bin/false -g tomcat -d /opt/tomcat tomcat

Next, download the Tomcat 7 with the following command:

wget https://archive.apache.org/dist/tomcat/tomcat-7/v7.0.109/bin/apache-tomcat-7.0.109.tar.gz 

Next, create a directory for Tomcat and extract the downloaded file to /opt/tomcat directory:

mkdir /opt/tomcat
tar -xvzf apache-tomcat-7.0.109.tar.gz -C /opt/tomcat/ --strip-components=1

Next, navigate to the /opt/tomcat directory and set proper permission and ownership:

cd /opt/tomcat
chgrp -R tomcat /opt/tomcat
chmod -R g+r conf
chmod g+x conf
chown -R tomcat webapps/ work/ temp/ logs/

Create a Systemd Service File for Tomcat

Next, you will need to create a systemd service file to manage the Tomcat service. You can create it with the following command:

nano /etc/systemd/system/tomcat.service

Add the following lines:

[Unit]
Description=Apache Tomcat Web Application Container
After=network.target
[Service]
Type=forking
Environment=JAVA_HOME=/usr/lib/jvm/java-1.8.0-openjdk-amd64
Environment=CATALINA_PID=/opt/tomcat/temp/tomcat.pid
Environment=CATALINA_HOME=/opt/tomcat
Environment=CATALINA_BASE=/opt/tomcat
Environment=’CATALINA_OPTS=-Xms512M -Xmx1024M -server -XX:+UseParallelGC’
ExecStart=/opt/tomcat/bin/startup.sh
ExecStop=/opt/tomcat/bin/shutdown.sh
User=tomcat
Group=tomcat
UMask=0007
RestartSec=10
Restart=always
[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Save and close the file then reload the systemd daemon to apply the changes:

systemctl daemon-reload

Next, start the Tomcat service with the following command:

systemctl start tomcat

You can now check the status of the Tomcat service with the following command:

systemctl status tomcat

You will get the following output:

● tomcat.service - Apache Tomcat Web Application Container
     Loaded: loaded (/etc/systemd/system/tomcat.service; disabled; vendor preset: enabled)
     Active: active (running) since Wed 2022-02-23 08:48:12 UTC; 6s ago
    Process: 10027 ExecStart=/opt/tomcat/bin/startup.sh (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS)
   Main PID: 10049 (java)
      Tasks: 28 (limit: 4686)
     Memory: 94.1M
     CGroup: /system.slice/tomcat.service
             └─10049 /usr/lib/jvm/java-1.8.0-openjdk-amd64/bin/java -Djava.util.logging.config.file=/opt/tomcat/conf/logging.properties -Djav>

Feb 23 08:48:12 ubuntu2004 systemd[1]: Starting Apache Tomcat Web Application Container...
Feb 23 08:48:12 ubuntu2004 startup.sh[10027]: Tomcat started.
Feb 23 08:48:12 ubuntu2004 systemd[1]: Started Apache Tomcat Web Application Container.

At this point, Tomcat is started and listens on port 8080.

Install OpenMRS

First, create a directory for OpenMRS and set proper ownership with the following command:

mkdir /var/lib/OpenMRS
chown -R tomcat:tomcat /var/lib/OpenMRS

Next, download the latest version of OpenMRS using the following command:

wget https://sourceforge.net/projects/openmrs/files/releases/OpenMRS_Platform_2.5.0/openmrs.war

Once the download is completed, copy the downloaded file to the Tomcat webapps directory:

cp openmrs.war /opt/tomcat/webapps/

Next, change the ownership of the openmrs.war file to tomcat:

chown -R tomcat:tomcat /opt/tomcat/webapps/openmrs.war

Access OpenMRS Installation Wizard

Now, open your web browser and access the OpenMRS web installation wizard using the URL http://your-server-ip:8080/openmrs. You should see the OpenMRS language selection screen:

Select your language and click on the => button. You should see the Installation Type screen.

Select the type of installation you want and click on the => button. You should see the following screen:

Provide your MySQL root password, note down the admin password, and click on the => button. You should see the following screen:

Click on the => button to create a database for OpenMRS and complete the installation.

Now, open your web browser and access the OpenMRS admin interface using the URL http://your-server-ip:8080/openmrs. You should see the OpenMRS login screen:

Provide the default username as admin and password as Admin123, then click on the LOG IN button. You should see the OpenMRS dashboard on the following screen:

We hope that our step-by-step guide on installing OpenMRS has made the process much clearer and easier for you. Now, we’d love to hear from you:

Do you have any concerns about the steps or need more detailed information? Can you suggest other areas of interest or step-by-step tutorials that you would like us to explore in our future posts?

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